The power of truth and lies in our world

A recent email had us thinking of Mark Twain, John Adams and Stephen Colbert.

Let’s start with Twain who wrote: “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”

That’s the right sentiment to describe the email which claims that Col. Oliver North warned then Sen. Al Gore about Osama Bin Laden during congressional testimony in 1987. The hoax spread like wildfire after the Sept. 11 attacks. It was so popular that North debunked it himself by pointing out (among other things) that he was not questioned by Gore and that th...